Snapchat to Push Original Scripted Content by 2018

Another week, another tech heavyweight jumping into original scripted content.

Snap VP of Content Nick Bell hinted at Snapchat debuting scripted shows by the start of 2018 at the Edinburgh TV Festival in Scotland on Wednesday. “We can expect to see scripted shows on Snapchat before the end of the year,” said Bell.

It wouldn’t be Snap’s maiden voyage with originals — the popular messaging app has debuted a slate of new shows this year, including “Phone Swap,” where two people trade their phones on a first date and see if they’d want to go out with the other person. Another dating show, hosted by rapper Action Bronson, is set to launch, and NBC News recently started airing two broadcasts a day on Snapchat.

Still, Bell’s announcement marks the first time Snapchat will try scripted content since the widely-panned “Literally Can’t Even” back in 2015. The show centered on Sasha Spielberg — daughter of Steven Spielberg — as she tried to get over a breakup without being able to drink alcohol. It was, uh, not well received.

With Snap looking to add scripted content to its lineup, it adds to an increasingly competitive space in the tech world. Apple’s plans to spend $1 billion on original programming was revealed last week, and earlier this month Facebook unleashed its “Watch” tab that’ll feature dozens of new shows. Add in Netflix spending more than $6 billion a year on shows, along with Hulu and HBO, and it’s easy to see why it’s a great time to be a TV writer.

The Facebook co-founder purchased The New Republic in 2012, becoming executive chairman and publisher. However, he sold the venerable political magazine to Win McCormack in 2016, saying he "underestimated the difficulty of transitioning an old and traditional institution into a digital media company in today’s quickly evolving climate."

The eBay founder is a well-known philanthropist who created First Look Media, a journalism venture behind The Intercept. Inspired by Edward Snowden's leaks. Omidyar teamed up with journalists Glenn Greenwald, Jeremy Scahill and Laura Poitras to launch the website “dedicated to the kind of reporting those disclosures required: fearless, adversarial journalism.”

The PayPal co-founder doesn’t own a news organization, but he makes this list because he essentially ended one -- Gawker -- proving once again the power of an angry billionaire. Thiel secretly bankrolled Hulk Hogan’s sex-tape lawsuit against Gawker Media because he was upset that the website once outed him as gay. Hogan won the defamation lawsuit against the site that sent its parent company into bankruptcy, and Gawker.com is no longer operating.

OK, so Facebook isn’t technically a news organization… yet. However, the company is preparing to launch its much-anticipated lineup of original content later this summer, and there are also signs that it's on the verge of becoming an even bigger media platform.

Campbell Brown, Head of News Partnerships at Facebook, confirmed last week it’s developing a subscription service for publishers willing to post articles directly to Facebook Instant Articles, rather than their native websites.